


I Will Remember

by Encre



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Antisemitism, Holocaust, M/M, Violence, eruri - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-03
Updated: 2017-02-20
Packaged: 2018-01-14 09:37:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1261564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Encre/pseuds/Encre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>WWII AU. Levi and Erwin are reincarnated, Levi as a French Jew (with no memory of his past life) and Erwin as a German soldier (who remembers everything).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. God is Good

**Author's Note:**

> Oh geez I'm so nervous to post this. Sorry, the first couple of chapters may turn out to be sort of short...  
> Warning! This isn't fluffy. At all. It would be inappropriate if I made it so.

It was the summer of 1940. Military propaganda littered the streets; posters with swastikas and German slogans splashed across them in messy, unorganized paint were plastered onto the bricks, along with various graffiti expressing the extreme discomfort of the people. Billboards boasted loud colors, telling people to _support France in the war!_ , _Join the army!_ , and various other promotions to which no one in the town really paid much attention.

            The once majestic, outstanding buildings that littered the streets now appeared so dull, so utterly lifeless; the entire town may as well have not existed at all. They had been defiled brick by brick, defaced by both those who were loyal to the Nazi party and those who were not. Bright red swastikas were oozing onto the sidewalks, an ironically justified type of graffiti that was illegal to even speak negatively about.

            And to think France had been completely free only a week before.

 

\--

The men were shrouded in thunder. They marched, perfectly in step, through the streets of Paris, a grotesque parade of monochromatic sheep that followed no one except their beloved shepherd, the Führer, who kept their ever-forward gaze clouded with ignorance, anti-Semitism, and hatred. Their boots resounded through the city, booming and rumbling like a rainstorm. To most of the French citizens that clogged the streets, their bodies pressed together in anticipation for the procession, they looked marvelous, like the soldiers in the cinema. To others, however, watching from the window of their dingy one-bedroom apartment, the men appeared as puppets on sharp German strings; like terrifying, brainwashed dolls.

            Driven forward without resistance.

            From the window of that dingy apartment, a woman and her son watched in horror as the Nazis marched through the streets they called home. Absently, she reached up with a shaky hand, and gripped the begrimed yellow star sewn into her sleeve, cursing under her breath and pulling the curtains shut with fervor.

            They needed to leave, and they needed to leave now.

            “ _Mon petit_ ,” she murmured to her son, who was still standing by the window, staring at the cheap fabric of the curtains. “Levi.”

            A soldier below stopped amidst his formation and turned, staring up at the window, and shouted something in German. Suddenly every Nazi halted and turned towards the pair in the apartment, as did the crowd, and they stared, and they laughed.

            “Levi!”

            The man at the window jolted suddenly, pulled violently from his daydream.

            Just to be sure, he pulled the heavy curtain back just a bit and peeked outside, a sick sense of relief washing over him when he saw that the Germans still marched ever onward, paying no attention to the insects they crushed beneath their black, polished boots.

            “Go get your father,” The woman commanded, and the man obeyed, letting his pale fingertips release the curtains, finding it difficult to move them at all as they trembled.

            “ _Oui, maman_ ,” He murmured, maneuvering through the narrow walkways and steep insteps of his apartment, which was hidden behind the apartment of another man, who had been gracious enough to hide them from the rest of Paris just a few weeks before, even though it had not come under Nazi occupation yet.

            At least, it hadn’t when they had moved in, and they hadn’t expected it to for at least a month after this.

            Levi’s hands shook with anxiety, making it difficult for him to grasp the rusted brass doorknob to his father’s study. He had to wrap his left (and equally unsteady) hand around the wrist of his right in order to steady himself enough to open the door, without knocking. Initially, his father was annoyed, and looked up, ready to reprimand his son for the interruption, but his words caught in his throat when he saw the expression of utter helplessness plastered onto his son’s pallid face.

            “Papa,” Levi started, voice shaking just as much as his hands. “They’ve occupied Paris.”

 

At this point, I feel that I should bring a few things to your attention. The first of which being that Levi’s family was Jewish. Obviously. It consisted of just the three of them: 19-year-old Levi, the son, Leah, the mother, and Jacob, the father. Initially they had owned a vineyard, but after they were forced to move in behind the apartment of a gracious Christian, they struggled to eat more than once a day.

            Levi’s family had lived in Bordeaux until 1939, when it was rumored to be turned into a German military outpost (and it had been, so thank God the family had escaped when they did), and their salvation had come in the form of a family friend who happened to have a studio apartment as an extension to his own. The hidden apartment was small, had no hot water, and only one window, but it was still better than a concentration camp. And for that, the family was thankful.

            Up until then, they had been living quiet, devout lives. Of course, even with the Nazis there, their lives were still rather quiet and devout; only now, they would be killed for it.

“What?” Jacob rose slowly from his seat, staring into his son’s face with utter disbelief. “What did you just say?”

            “The Germans, Papa,” Levi repeated, gripping the doorknob so hard that his knuckles turned white. “They’re here.”

            Jacob was slow to move at first, passing Levi in the doorway and making his way towards the kitchen, where Leah stood, hunched over the sink, feeling more nauseous than she had ever felt in her life. Her husband went to her, tried to console her with gentle touches and hollow words, and from the hallway Levi could see that the intricate sentences his father wove seemed to drape over the both of them, and were meant more to soothe himself than to soothe his wife.

 

            There was not a sound in the world more terrifying than the knock on the door that resounded through the tiny apartment just then. Everyone froze, staring in disbelief at the dreary slab of wood, the only thing protecting them from the segregation of the outside world, though they knew exactly who it was that stood behind it, because there was only one other person in the world aware of their existence.

            Again, they knocked, hushed and rapid.

            Finally, Levi moved, his frozen muscles giving him just enough leeway to step forward and unlock the door, swinging it open.

            There stood their salvation, Émile Chaput. The man who had taken them in when they were at their weakest.

            The man was tall. Taller than Levi (then again, most people were), and he stepped in without an invitation. Jacob turned and opened his mouth to speak, but Émile silenced him with a raised hand. “I know,” was all he said.

            He stayed in their apartment for three and a half hours that night (an incredible risk on his part), telling the family that France had surrendered the Northern half of its country to Germany, and that Paris was included in that Northern half. Just like that, the government had signed a treaty, and given up half of their country.

            Just like that, with nothing but black ink and a quill pen, their own country had signed away their lives.

            Just like that.

            Leah began to sob into her hands, and repeatedly, Levi had to leave the room to grab her a new handkerchief.

            Émile assured them that he would keep them safe.

            “I will get you out of here, to Lyon, in the free half of France,” he promised. “I can have the tickets by tonight, and you can leave tomorrow morning. Bring nothing with you.”

            Jacob thanked him repeatedly, and embraced him one last time before the man left for several hours. An uncomfortable silence blanketed the apartment, and the family sat, crushed beneath the weight of trepidation, wondering which breath might be their last. When their salvation returned, none of them had moved from the spaces they were in when he had left. Émile opened their front door, tickets in hand, and watched as three heads turned towards him.

            “I’ve got the tickets,” He said, placing them on a table by the door and turning to leave. “You leave at six a.m.”

\--

It was Émile who took them to the train station the next morning as well. The three of them brought nothing, as they were instructed. Levi had taken a photo of his mother and father, and stuffed it in the breast pocket of his coat before they had left their apartment for the last time. His father had brought all the money they had (which was not much). The only thing the trio clutched in their shivering hands as they boarded the train that morning were their tickets and the fake papers that had been printed for them but six hours prior.

            Eli stared at them as they sat in his lap on the way there. There was something written in German on his father’s ticket, but it was a language that no one in their tiny family spoke. Levi found this odd, considering that Émile had no idea how to speak German (or so they thought), but no one else besides him could have written it.

 As the tickets were punched and handed back, Jacob noticed the way Levi eyed the ticket in his hands, and asked if he wanted to trade.

            “Yes, please,” Replied his son, and that was the last thing Levi said to his father before he fell asleep.

 

            The train did not go to Lyon. Instead, the train pulled into a station in Munich, Germany, and Levi was startled awake by the sound of barking dogs and German curses.

            His father was the first one off of the train, and they shot him right in the head, continuing to shout as he fell dead onto the platform, and as Leah stumbled out next, screaming at the top of her lungs, hunched over the bloody, unrecognizable lump of flesh that had once belonged to her husband. She shouted horrible curses at them, in French, black eyes burning with a kind of rage that Levi had never seen before. The boy himself was still glued to the floor of the train, eyes wide, body trembling as the soldiers dragged his mother by her dark brown hair to a truck that waited just outside the station.

            The last thing Levi saw was the swastika sewn into the sleeves of each soldier, and the yellow Star of David on his mother’s chest, splattered with his father’s blood, the brand of their religion staring him right in the face, mocking him.

            A soldier at the edge of the platform pointed at Levi as the boy stumbled off of the train, hollering something that caused the rest of them to turn their heads and stare.

            Then he ran. He ran until his chest felt like it was about to burst, until the poisonous German air around him was suffocated him, stuffing his lungs with discrimination and hatred until he could no longer breathe. Levi braced himself against a building, having stopped in an alleyway, amongst dumpsters and trash heaps somewhere in the middle of the city. _Right where I belong_ , he thought.

            He did not know the distance or speed at which he had been running, but he no longer heard the dogs barking behind him, or the gunshots that had scraped his heels. It was a miracle he hadn’t been shot. His legs trembled, and he fell to his knees, leaning forward and vomiting until his stomach had nothing left to expel, and then once more for good measure.

            His father was dead.

            His mother was taken away and he had abandoned her.

            The Jew stood once more, shaking like a beaten dog, and turned to exit the alley, to keep running, to find somewhere, anywhere to hide. But three boys that couldn’t have been more than two years younger than him blocked his escape.

            They spoke German. Words that the Jew did not understand. And then suddenly two of them were holding him down against the wall, ripping off his overcoat and slinging it over their shoulders. For a moment it looked as though they were about to leave him there like that, but then the tallest of the three spotted the mustard yellow patch that had been hidden beneath his overcoat, sewn onto his shirt. Though the brand was in French, it was still so obvious and recognizable it was a wonder they didn’t just start shouting and alerting everyone of his existence right then and there. Instead, the boy took a hunting knife from the shaft of his boot, and stared at the yellow patch once more.

            The Star of David.

            He sneered.

Levi did not remember what happened next. He woke up in a bed, on his back, staring up at a dark, unfamiliar ceiling and wondering where the hell he was.

            A dull pain in his forearm prompted him to sit up and examine it. And there, on his wrist, a bloody, swollen swastika had been carved into his skin, oozing puss and putrescence. The puss and discolored blood that leaked from the wounds carved into his flesh told him that it was infected, but there was nothing he could do about that. He could hardly feel his fingers, anyway.

            The Jew swung his feet over the edge of the bed and stood up, wobbly on his feet. Where was he, and what was was he doing here? Where was his mother, his father?

            He stumbled around for a few minutes before he found a flight of stairs, and upon them sat a woman with strawberry blonde hair and blue eyes. He stumbled back, frightened for a moment before she smiled kindly at him, and said something in German, to which he replied, “ _Je ne parle pas allemande_.”

            “English?” Her accent was heavy, but he understood her just the same.

            “Yes,” he said, and waited for her to respond. She sat for a moment and thought, trying to bring the words she needed to the tip of her tongue.

            “I found you in the street,” she began, and suddenly, all of the memories of his arrival in Germany came flooding back to him, and he was unable to stop himself from turning and vomiting into a bucket that lay at his feet.

_She found me in the street._

            The woman didn’t seem surprised at all by his reaction, and stayed on the stairs, standing this time. She was shorter than he was, by a few inches, but it was hard to tell when he was doubled over a bucket.

            “My name is Petra,” She said. “My husband and I found you and brought you here. Don’t come upstairs, the soldiers might see you.”

            And that was when Levi realized that this woman was risking her life to save some dirty, homeless kid that she had found in an alley. He was still wearing his star, a faded yellow thing on his arm that read “ _Juif_ ” like a cattle brand. She had known he was Jewish. Wanted. And yet she had still brought him out of the streets, and into her home, hiding him down below her floorboards, in a bomb shelter. How they had carried him all the way there so inconspicuously was beyond him.

            Levi was still shaking when he attempted to stand again, trying to collect himself, and doing a fine job of pretending that he had until he stumbled and fell back onto his knees.

            “Thank you,” He said. “I’ll leave tonight.”

            She shot him a glare. “No, you’re not leaving at all. Do you have any idea what’s waiting for you out there?”

            “I’ve got a pretty good idea.” He spit once more into the bucket and stood up again, keeping his footing his time.

            “You’re staying here, and that’s final.” She turned and stomped up the stairs before he had a chance to argue.

            The door shut, and everything was black again.

            And suddenly, Levi became acutely aware of just how alone he really was. There was no one here with him, no one to save him. No one to hold him close and console him, tell him it was going to be alright. No God. It was like a dream. It did not feel real.

            He reached out into the darkness, his hand falling against the cold stone walls of the shelter, and staying there. He was alive. He remained alive, and safe, while his father was dead and his mother was taken to God knows where.

            It made him ache, to know that he had abandoned her. Made his gut twist in agony and bring forth the urge to vomit again.

            He hadn’t even said goodbye.

            Levi wanted to reach into his coat and take out the picture of his family, even though he could not see it. The realization that his coat and his picture were gone made a lump form in his throat. He slipped his hand into the pocket of his trousers instead and ran his fingers over his father’s train ticket, tears forming at the corners of his eyes and cascading down his cheeks. He was alone.

            Or, perhaps, he wasn’t.

            He cleared his throat and took a deep breath, bowing his head, and beginning to pray. His prayers were full of unanswerable questions, full of doubt and remorse and maybe just a tiny sliver of hatred. Levi had been nothing but obedient, nothing but loyal. Was this his reward?

            “Do you even exist?” The question dripped from his lips like venom, and his voice echoed off of the stone walls that surrounded him, another reminder that the room was empty. “Do you even care?”

            Then he lifted his head again, staring into black, waiting for Him to reply. The silence was louder than any answer he was hoping to receive.

            Levi stood there, in the darkness, contemplating the power of God.

            He could give, and He could take, and in this case, He had done both.

 


	2. Intrusion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for kinda gross descriptions of wounds I guess?? Also ERWIN WOO

It had been exactly three months since the Jewish vagrant had arrived and been taken in by Petra and Auruo Bossard, stowed away beneath the floorboards of a little house in Munich, Germany. He remained beneath the house in a hidden cellar, intended to be used for storage of extra food and things, which was no bigger than eight by ten feet, with a six-foot ceiling. With the ridiculous food rations implemented by the German government, all of the food that they received in a month could not fill up more than a quarter of the little space below the house. It left more than enough room for the vagabond.

Over the brief few months of Levi’s little sojourn, the burned flesh of his wrist had become grotesquely infected, spitting pus and blood and putrescence whenever it was touched. The family had not noticed. Or, at least, the Jew hoped that they hadn’t; they were already risking their lives to keep him hidden away in their home—the least he could do was lessen their worries, and lie about his health. Either way, their medical rations were mediocre at best, so it wasn’t like they had much help to offer in the first place.

When fever kept him awake at night, he would simply lay against the ground, and press his cheek into the cool concrete beneath him.

            There was only one way in and out of the cellar: a small trapdoor, which was hidden beneath a rug in the Bossard’s living room. Often, during the evening, Petra would leave the door open for the Jew inside, to try in vain to filter out the pungent air that blanketed the crypt. Of course, Levi was never allowed outside. He was forbidden from even standing on the stairs.

            He defecated in a bucket (the very same that he had gagged into upon his first arrival) that was emptied once or twice every few days. It didn’t matter how many times Auruo emptied it—the stench remained, and did nothing but deteriorate the Jew’s health.

            As for meals, Petra was barely rationed enough to feed herself and her husband, let alone the little secret that was tucked away beneath her feet. Levi did not ask for food. He did not have the right to demand anything from these people; they had taken him in, housed him, saved his life (though he wondered if this incarceration constituted “living”), and were risking their lives to keep him. He did not have the right to be picky.

            He was lucky that he even got the scraps of bread and soup that he did, and he knew it. So he nibbled on the food, and thanked the family above him constantly.

            Between bouts of fever, Levi often found himself thinking that surely his death would be a benefactor to his two saviors—their only problem would be finding a way to dispose of his body.

 He still prayed twice a day, and before his meals, whenever he thought about it, but always ended the prayers with the same question—“Can you even hear me?” Believing is seeing—that was the definition of faith, and he knew it. He asked for forgiveness for his doubt constantly, trying to convince himself that God worked in mysterious ways, and that soon, all would be well.

            Levi prayed for the Bossards far more than he ever prayed for himself. He asked for them to be blessed for their good deeds, and for them to be fed, for them to be safe when everything was over.

            The Jew found himself kneeling on the steps most hours of the day, asking impossible questions of a deity who may as well not exist at all.

            Petra often opened the trapdoor and found him kneeling there on the bottom step, bowing his head so low that his nose nearly brushed against the rough wood of the stairway, muttering words in a language that she did not understand.

            “… What are you doing?” She asked once, finally, holding a small bowl of soup in her hands.

            Levi did not respond for several more seconds, and eventually lifted his head to look at her. “I was saying the Hashkiveinu,” He responded, rolling his eyes when he noticed the confused look on her face. “It’s a prayer. In Hebrew.”

            “You speak Hebrew?”

            “Of course I speak Hebrew,” A small pang of guilt shot through the man when he noticed the split second of offense on Petra’s face, and apologized immediately. “Sorry—” He began, and was cut off by the woman’s reply.

            “Mm, no, it’s fine,” She told him with a warm smile, setting the bowl on the steps, and sitting down next to it. “What’s the Hashkiveinu?”

            “It’s sort of like a bedtime prayer. You say it before you sleep.”

            “But it’s the middle of the day. Were you going to take a nap?”

            His silence was vaguely unsettling, and that was when the redhead on the steps noticed just how unwell the Jew looked; he was pale (more so than usual), and his eyes were rimmed with dark black and purple discoloration, the rest of his pallid skin coated in a light sheen of sweat. His fingers were bony, as was the rest of him, and his clothes hung off of his emaciated frame like rotting flesh from a corpse.

            The smile faded from her face.

            “… You think you’re going to die.” It was not a question.

            Again, the Jew said nothing, only took the small bowl of soup from the steps and brought it to his lips, sipping the warm liquid gingerly, like it would burn him if he ate too fast. The two of them were silent for several more minutes while Levi finished the rest of his soup. When he handed the bowl back to her, she took it from him solemnly, and stood up to return it to the kitchen, but stopped moving entirely when Levi muttered something.

            “What was that?” She asked, hazel eyes burning with emotions that she could not describe.

            “I said that kneeling all day is painful,” He replied, mercury hues shifting to fall upon the woman’s face. “And that there doesn’t seem to be a point.”

            “Then why do you do it?”

            “I’ve been asking myself that question for three months.”

            The redhead swallowed thickly and did not reply. The two of them stood in silence for what seemed like years, until the Jew finally turned his head and returned to the darkness of the cellar, where he belonged.

 

 

Levi was not fed for three more days after that. Not because of his previous conversation with Petra, but because the couple upstairs barely had enough to feed themselves (they didn’t eat much more than he did those three days). Petra had come down once or twice to check on him, and ask him if he was doing alright, to which he replied, “As good as I’ll ever be.”

On the first of the month they received their new ration card, and Petra opened the cellar door to bring Levi a bit of bread and cheese.

            “Guten tag!” She called cheerfully down the steps, and hesitated a few moments in anticipation, visibly paling when there was no response. Not even a rustle of the sheets, as there usually was.

            The redhead allowed the trapdoor to swing all the way open and remain as such as she climbed hesitantly down the creaky staircase, each groan of the wood beneath her weight echoing through the little room below, making it sound empty. Her heart made a great leap into her throat when she realized that it might as well be.

            Silently, the woman set the small meal down on the steps, and continued to make her way down the staircase into the cold, dark basement below. Her fingertips trembled as she reached out to grasp the small chain that hung from the ceiling, tugging on it to allow the old, dim light bulb to illuminate what it could.

            Petra was afraid to look around the room. More because of her selfishness than anything else; she did not want to find Levi dead. Not because he meant something to her (though he did, don’t misunderstand), but because she would have no way to dispose of the body. For the rest of her life, she would be reminded that she failed to save yet another innocent man, and be forced to let him rot in her basement until someone smelled his rancid flesh upon entering her house.

            So, because of these thoughts swimming in her head, the redhead stood there for several moments, slender fingers curled around the chain, gripping it hard, completely alone.

            Slowly, she turned around, eyes scanning the room for anything that vaguely resembled life, as if she were afraid of what she might find—afraid that he _was_ alive.

            “Hello?” She called again, and her feet bolted to the floor as soon as she was facing the wall, keeping her in a fixed position and facing the cold brick of the basement instead of turning around to face the reality of the rest of the room. She had not yet brought herself to look upon the bed. She was terrified of what she would find.

            Suddenly the air seemed so much heavier, and Petra briefly understood what it was like for the Jew down in that basement, with the weight of the world upon his shoulders, and no other company but his God and his mind.

            “Please say something.” She murmured softly, burying her face in her hands. “Please…” She would have said his name just then, but it suddenly dawned on her that she did not know it. She had barricaded him in a room, letting him fester beneath her feet, feeding him scraps for three months and had not even bothered to ask for his name.

            A soft grunt from the corner of the room snapped the redhead out of her stupor, and she whipped around, blue eyes falling upon the little crumpled form on the cot.

            “… Petra?” His voice was shaky and uncertain. The feverish delirium was painfully evident.

            “I’m here!” She called, perhaps a little too loud, as she stumbled through the cluttered basement and over to the bed in the corner. “I’m here, it’s alright. You’re alright.”

            “Do I look alright to you?”

            No. No, he didn’t. His normally pallid skin had paled even more, blue and green veins crawling over his skin, which clung to his bones like cheap fabric. His cheekbones had been sharp when he had arrived, but now they were even sharper, and his cheeks were hollow, sucked inwards toward a mouth that he never used for anything more than prayer and the occasional conversation.

            “Yes, of course!”

            “Don’t bullshit me, Petra.”

            She bit her lip. “… Alright, maybe not so good.”

            “I feel like shit,” He murmured, clutching his damp forehead with a clammy hand. “I didn’t even hear you come in.”

            As the Jew lifted his hand to wipe his hair from his forehead, Petra caught a glimpse of the wound on his wrist; swollen and red and irritated, and her mouth fell agape.

“What the _hell_ is that?” She inquired fiercely, narrowing her eyes and wrapping her hand around his forearm, squeezing, watching him cry out beneath her in pain. “Why didn’t you tell me about this? You’re _dying!_ ”

“That doesn’t matter!” He shouted back at her, trying in vain to wriggle out of her grasp, forcing dark-colored blood and pus to ooze from his wound and onto Petra’s fingers. “I’ll die no matter where I am, so who cares?”

A harsh smack to the face quieted him almost instantly. Petra glared down at him, her grip on his arm relentless and firm. “ _I_ care. I dragged you almost a mile from that alleyway into my basement and I save my only food for you _every week,_ so don’t you _dare_ tell me that no one cares. I’m trying to keep you alive, and I’ll be damned if I’ll let your victim complex get in my way.”

Levi glared at the redhead above him, though his protesting had ceased. He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, relaxing in her grip just a tad. His distrust in her was painfully evident in every move he made, every breath he took, and it made the poor woman’s heart ache, but she did not relent in her pursuit of his trust.

Slowly, she let her fingers unfurl from around his paper-thin forearm, wiping the infection from her fingers with a handkerchief. “Auruo knows a little first aid, and we have whiskey to clean it. Don’t ask where we got it, we’ve had it for a long time. I’ll go get him, and we are going to clean this.” She pointed angrily at the burn on his arm, turning and leaving the basement without waiting for a reply.

It took them almost an hour just to bring his fever down enough to get coherent sentences from him. They packed snow from outside into buckets and brought those downstairs, pressing it to the nape of his neck, his wrists, and the backs of his knees, force-feeding him whatever water they had on hand. When the man had calmed down enough, Auruo began asking him his questions: When did this happen? With what were you burned?

The replies were short, disinterested, coated with fever. But Auruo found out what he needed to, and then asked Petra to press snow onto the wound until Levi could no longer feel it. Not that it really mattered; it had probably hurt far more for the past few months than it would now. The couple catered to the little vagabond left and right, cutting open his wrist to squeeze out the puss, pouring their alcohol onto it, holding him while he writhed.

Nearly a week later, and the infection was no better than it had been. They had waited far too long to treat it, and they didn’t have the medical supplies necessary to do so. Levi’s clothes were always damp, and they could not risk bringing him upstairs to bathe him until late at night. When they finally did get him clean, he seemed to relax a lot more.

Every day, they came downstairs to squeeze the puss from the wound, to clean it, and dress it as best they could. It was a slow process, and Levi’s condition only seemed to be worsening as time went on.

Soon, he was unable to stand unassisted, and within a week after that, he was unable to stand at all. He was staring Death in the face, just as he had been when he’d arrived; but now, his cold, dark clutches seemed to be so much closer, so much more real. There was no God to save him now.

Petra moved his cot closer to the door, next to the stairs, so that it was easier to access him when it was needed, and also so that he had more fresh air whenever they left the trapdoor open. Levi had ceased to pray. Mostly because he had forgotten, but also because he felt as though there were no longer a point. He laid in his bed at night, staring at the dark ceiling, the silence blanketing his ears and making them ring.

“Fuck you,” He said quietly to himself one night (or maybe it were morning, or afternoon), hands balling weakly into fists at his sides. “Fuck you. All I’ve ever been is loyal, and faithful, and now, the only time I’ve ever _needed_ you, it turns out that you don’t actually give a shit. We’re not your children. _I’m_ not your child. You’re not going to save me, and neither is anyone else.”

Just then, the trapdoor swung open, and Levi turned his head, expecting to see Petra there. It took his eyes a moment to adjust to the bright light, and when they finally focused, the man who stood, shrouded in the light of the entryway, was not Petra, nor Auruo. The first thing that Levi noticed was the bright red-and-black swastika pinned to a green uniform sleeve, and the second thing he noticed was the sickeningly familiar boots, black and shining like a diamond.

There were unfamiliar voices echoing throughout the hallway behind the soldier, and Levi was unable to move, still frozen in place.

“ _Erwin Sturmbannführer_!” There was a shout from behind the man, who turned his gaze from the Jew to the three men behind him. “ _Hast du nichts finden?_ Did you find anything?”

The man turned his head back to Levi, and for a moment, he looked just as frightened as the little vagabond at his feet was. He hesitated a moment, not breaking eye contact with Levi. With tears in his eyes, Levi mouthed a single word: Please.

“ _Nein, nichts wichtiges_ ,” The soldier replied, letting the trapdoor swing shut again. “Nothing important. We’re finished here.”


	3. Danke

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OH MY GOD YOU GUYS ARE ALL SO WONDERFUL THANK YOU FOR ALL OF YOUR KUDOS AND WONDERFUL COMMENTS!! they keep me young smh  
> Seriously, thank you all so much, I'm so glad that you're enjoying this. (also if any of my translations are ever off please for the love of god let me know so that I can look like an idiot for the least amount of time possible mk <3)  
> THIS CHAPTER IS THE SHORTEST SO FAR IM SORRY!! I promise the rest will be much longer and more satisfactory. <3 ily thank you for reading

Children often have nightmares. Regardless of how insignificant these terrors may seem to a parent or older sibling, they will keep the child up at night, sitting in their bed, too terrified to move. They will stare into the dark, and slowly fade back into awareness, or fall asleep, and forget about the nightmare completely.

            Levi had suffered from night terrors like that since he was an infant; the slow, sinking feeling that settles in the pit of your stomach and forces your eyes to remain open wide in the darkness, denying any form of sleep, no matter how tired you are, was rather familiar to him. Levi knew this feeling better than anyone, which also meant that he knew just how to will it away and go back to sleep, and wake up in the safety of the sunlight once again.

            This, however, was no nightmare. Levi could not will himself to sleep it off, and wake up back in his home, with his father alive, and his mother too. No amount of hot tea or gentle words could chase away these horrible black-toed monsters. They would continue to chase after him until his inevitable expiration, whether it be brought on by their hands or his own.

            The vagabond sat there, in the darkness, light-headed and weary from the stress of it all, trembling like a leaf in a burst of cold wind. What was he supposed to do now? Should he get up and hide? The German soldier’s presence was still clear to him by the heavy, polished footsteps that echoed through the floorboards, rattling his eardrums and making him shake a little harder. They’d found him. He was done for, and so were Petra and Auruo and—

            He heard the front door creak open, and two sets of polished black footsteps exit the house. Petra bid them a cheerful German goodbye, and shut the door once again.

            The silence that now blanketed the house was absolutely suffocating. Levi could hear his heart thump in his ears, blood rushing through his veins and blowing his pupils wide with terror, making his body shake and his mind reel. He had not heard all three soldiers leave the house, which meant that one was still lurking inside.

            Suddenly the trapdoor swung open again, and Levi flung himself back against the cold brick wall, clambering up against it as though he were trying to push himself through and escape. The sheets on the bed were tangled with his legs and his feet, anchoring him, not allowing him to move. His chest heaved, his hands clammy and cold. His head swam, making him sway against the wall where he was pressed, his chest constricted so painfully that he doubled over with a small groan, clutching at it through the fabric of his grimy yellowed shirt, unable to catch his breath, unable to stand up straight, and he began to panic because he couldn’t stand and he couldn’t breathe and he was going to _die_ —

            “—Calm down!” It was Petra’s voice. “Breathe! Just breathe,”

            Levi opened his mouth in a pained gasp, and slowly faded back into reality, gradually realizing that Petra was cradling him to her chest, gently threading her fingers through his hair in an effort to calm him down. It felt nice, he thought briefly, as he caught his breath against her shoulder, finally coming down from his little episode.

            She was warm, and clean. His breathing was still shaky and rapid, and his heart felt as though it would burst through his chest, but he remained still and mostly coherent for a few more moments before an unfamiliar voice made him jolt in the redhead’s arms and nearly vomit up what little acid remained in his stomach.

            “Frau Bossard,” A deep, German voice, from the top of the staircase. “ _Relais die Nachricht. Sagen sonst niemand. Ich werde zurückkehren._ ” Levi did not understand what the man was saying, and his voice was commanding, intimidating, terrifying.

            “… _Ja._ ” Petra replied with a small nod of her head, her grip on Levi tightening when she felt him shock against her. There was a moment of heavy silence that blanketed the room before the trapdoor shut again and the family of three was left in complete darkness.

            None of them spoke for quite some time. The only sound that filled the room was Levi’s labored breathing, until Petra opened her mouth to speak.

            “Levi, that soldier is not going to hurt you,” She said softly, trying to calm the poor man down. “He was inspecting the houses on this street because there was talk of an escaped Jew who fled to an alleyway near here—”

            The man lifted his head, looking at the redhead in horror. “You mean—you mean they… they’re looking for me? They know who I am?”

“Someone must have tipped them off.”

“How did they know I was Jewish just from seeing me on the street?”

            “With dark hair and eyes like that? Any German would make that assumption.”

            Levi scoffed. “So everyone that isn’t blonde-haired and blue-eyed is a Jew. Hilarious.”

            “Anyway. That was a lieutenant in Hitler’s Third Reich,” Petra continued. “We don’t know why, but he said he wants to help you escape. He said he’s going to come back tomorrow.”

            “And you’re just going to trust him right off the bat?”

            “Don’t you think he would have killed you right then and there if he wasn’t sincere? They have strict shoot-on-sight orders for you. You’re lucky it was him who found you here—”

            “And how the hell do you know it’s not a trap?” He wriggled out of her arms, stumbling back again. “How do you know?”

            “I don’t!” She cried. “But we’ve got no choice. If we run, they will definitely kill all of us, and we won’t have a chance to find out if we could have survived or not.”

            “I don’t believe him! Those bastards killed my family—they’re killing my friends and loved ones as we speak, and you expect me to just blindly follow their orders?”

            “Wouldn’t you rather live believing in something and find out it isn’t real than to live not believing and find out it is?”

            Levi regarded her in the dim light, hesitant. Petra could see the terror behind his eyes. His chest was still heaving, his body shaking with uncertainty. He did not trust them. Not Petra, not Auruo, not the unnamed soldier. Levi was faced with a huge decision, but not an altogether difficult one. Either he remained with the Bossards, or he attempted to escape. As far as he could tell, either way, he was going to die.

            “… I suppose so,” he replied, his voice hoarse and timid, filled to the brim with trepidation.

            Petra smiled warmly. “Wonderful. Thank you. Thank you.” She reached out for him again, and let her hand rest gently against his cheek. “He ordered that we bathe you. Come. We’ll explain the rest later.”

            Auruo lifted the man up into his arms, surprised when he met no resistance from him, and carried him up the steps, waiting there at the top until Petra had checked to make sure that no one would see them hurry to the second floor to fill the bath with water.

 

            The next day, Petra brought Levi down a hefty slice of bread and a frankfurter, which she told him had been left by the soldier from the previous day. He thankfully gobbled down the food, deciding that if today was the day he was going to die, he should at least die with a full stomach.

            “He says he will bring us all extra rations, at least once a week…” She began, her voice timid, almost hoarse. “We already have coffee, but he says he’ll bring us sugar, and meat and good cheese and other things…”

            “Medicine?” Levi interjected, watching as she pushed open the trapdoor and stuck her head out.

            “Yes, of course,” she replied. “I said we needed antibiotics, and he seemed hesitant, but when I told him they were for you…” her voice trailed off, and the redhead worried her lower lip between her teeth. “He told us that he recognized you. Do you have any idea who he is?”

            Levi swallowed a mouthful of bread. “No, I’ve never seen him before…” The thought worried him. If this soldier simply mistook him for someone else, then he was fucked. He was so fucked. “Does he think I’m someone else?”

            “He called you Levi,” The Jew froze, staring at Petra with widened eyes. “And said that he knows you from a long, long time ago.”

            “… I don’t know him.”

            “Well, he certainly knows you.”

            A knock at the door interrupted their conversation, and Levi no longer felt hungry as he heard the door swing open, and Auruo greet the soldier at the door.

            “ _Guten tag,_ _Erwin Sturmbannführer._ ” His voice was low, and hesitant. There was no reply from the uninvited guest as he stepped inside. The door closed amidst whistles and hoots from his fellow soldiers outside.

            “Close the curtains, please,” The soldier said lowly, and was met with swift obedience from Auruo. Petra looked over at the Jew, and offered him her hand.

            “Time to come up, now.”

            His heart leaped into his throat, but Levi took her hand, and waited for her to help hoist him up. He had to lean against her as they made their way up the stairs, and it took them several minutes to clear them. When they had finished, Levi was out of breath, and paler than usual, so Petra had him sit down on a chair by the basement while she fetched him a glass of water.

            Levi still had his back to the soldier, who had been helping the husband close the shades in the kitchen. He was terrified to look at him. Terrified. He was shaking as he accepted the glass of cool water from Petra, and doubled over with exhaustion as he tried to lift it to his lips (Petra had to help him with that too). After he’d finished it, he abandoned the cup on the table by the couch, and took a deep breath as Petra hoisted him back up to bring him into the kitchen.

            The front door opened again, and the noise sent a jolt of fear down Levi’s spine. He looked to the door, expecting to see more soldiers there, rifles aimed and ready to fire. Instead, he saw Erwin, loosening his tie and hanging it over the handle of the front door, on the outside, as if to make sure that everyone outside knew he was inside the little house... More cheers and whistles came from his fellow soldiers as they passed by, and then the door was closed with an air of finality. Levi had not remembered actually making it to the kitchen, but there he was, struggling to sit down in a chair at the table.

            “What was that about?” Auruo asked, and the soldier finally turned to properly face the trio in the kitchen, and Levi allowed his eyes to wander over him, to get a good look.

            Blonde hair like spun gold, with eyes too bright to compare to ice or any kind of gemstone. His expression was stern, collected, as expected of any high-ranking soldier in Hitler’s Third Reich, but there was a certain air of kindness or mercy hidden beneath his clever guise of discipline that gave Levi an odd sense of nostalgia.

            With a sigh, the soldier tugged off his gloves and shook his head. “I will explain that later. We have more important matters to discuss.” He turned to look at Levi, with an air of familiarity that made the Jew shrink back into the chair he was seated upon. It was obvious that this man recognized him. There was no mistaking it; this soldier knew exactly who Levi was. He wasn’t confusing him for someone else.

            “Forgive my impatience, but I have to make this façade realistic. I cannot stay long,” He began again, striding over to Levi and kneeling down in front of him. The man flinched in his chair, and tried his best to scoot back, to keep himself away. It made him panic, to think about what this man might be doing to him, and he found himself wide-eyed with terror, trying once again to escape from his inescapable fate.

            A gentle, cool hand was laid against his feverish skin, and for a moment he thought it was Petra’s, until a deeper, more venerable voice yanked him back down to earth so hard it nearly gave him whiplash. “Levi.”

            In an instant, Levi’s world stopped crashing down around him, and he stopped struggling as the soldier continued. “I will not hurt you. I need to look at your arm.”

            Still shaking, the man gave no permission, but did not attempt to struggle as Erwin took Levi’s clammy, feverish hand in his own, and gently turned it over so that he could get a better look at the wound. It was still gaping, still festering, though it had improved just slightly. Erwin did not seemed phased by it, and instead reached into the satchel he had brought with him (which Levi hadn’t noticed, somehow) and took out a large, German-issued medical kit, which took up nearly all of the room in the satchel. If anyone had known that Erwin had brought that here, they would find it immediately suspicious; but it was a risk he had to take in order to save Levi’s life.

            “Frau Bossard,” Erwin glanced over at Petra, who stiffened immediately. “Please get me a towel. Make sure it is clean.”

            She nodded without a word and ran off somewhere in the unfamiliar house. Erwin popped open the top to the first-aid kit, and took out a small vial of rubbing alcohol. Auruo blinked a bit; it was a rare thing to see alcohol of any kind in a neighborhood such as the one they were currently in, especially alcohol for medical use. Levi was far too absorbed in the expression on Erwin’s face to notice the burning skin of his arm as it was cleaned.

            For a soldier, he was uncharacteristically gentle.

            It took nearly ten minutes for Erwin to get the wound clean enough to even begin to work with; and by the time he had, Petra had returned with a towel, for which he thanked her. He stood for a brief moment to shed his overcoat, and unfasten his cufflinks, rolling his sleeves up well past his forearms before kneeling back down again, taking out a few instruments and setting them on the towel.

            Levi was not entirely conscious for the entire procedure. The trek up the basement stairs had made him very weary, and so he fell asleep halfway through, and when he awoke, his arm was stitched up neatly, and (though still a bit pink) looked exponentially better than it had just an hour ago. He was sitting in the kitchen, alone, though as he faded back into consciousness he was aware of a low conversation in the hallway behind him.

            “… continue to clean it. I’ll leave this kit here, and I will return next week to look at him again.”

            “ _Danke, Erwin…_ ” It was Petra’s voice. “I don’t know what to say.”

            “Don’t thank me yet. I was only able to bring you extra ration cards today, but next week I will give you more…”

            “Please. This is more than enough already.”

            “I have to go now.”

            “Yes, alright. I’ll show you out.”

            “Thank you.”

            There were hushed footsteps, and then the door opened and closed again. For a moment, Levi thought he would be allowed to stay in the kitchen and sleep, but Petra hurried over to him, and tried to hoist him up from his seat. “Come on,” She murmured. “Auruo’s opening the windows.”

            A small groan of frustration left the man’s lips, but he allowed the redhead to help him stand again, and help him get down the steps. She forced him to down another glass of water before she let him lay back on the cot. She’d changed the sheets earlier today, and so it was fresh and crisp and felt more comfortable than it had since the first day he’d been invited into their home. It took him less than five minutes to fall into the warm, welcoming clutches of sleep.

 

Levi remained unconscious for almost an entire day. Petra checked on him, nervously, whenever she could, making sure he was still breathing. It was nerve wracking, listening to his labored sighs fill the room, watching as the wound on his wrist continued to ooze. She cleaned it and redressed it every few hours, and hardly even noticed whether it was improving, not allowing herself to realize that it was ridiculous to expect a significant difference to occur within the span of eight hours.

            She decided that perhaps it would be best to let the poor man rest for the day, and then come down and change his bandages again when she came to bring him dinner. It would most likely be best not to worry herself any longer. Besides, she shouldn’t risk letting people on the outside of her home see her coming in and out of the cellar so often.

            A small sigh left her lips as she reached out to brush a bit of damp black hair out of Levi’s face, watching his emaciated chest rise and fall beneath the sheets that covered him, and then ascended the stairs again, shutting the cellar door behind her. 

 

 


	4. Unearthing

“I understand that it’s frustrating, but when we discussed this previously you gave me no indication that it bothered you.” Erwin’s voice was low, calm. Like it always was. It was almost infuriating, Levi thought, the way it never raised or cracked.

            “That was before you told me you were going to be fucking my wife!” Auruo, however, had no problem raising _his_ voice. In fact, he made it quite apparent that he was upset, going so far as to slam his fist on the kitchen table.

            “I’m not going to be doing anything with your wife,” The soldier replied, his voice dropping to a growl. He seemed disgusted by Auruo’s foul language. “And you’ll do well to remember that you don’t have a choice in this matter. If you’ve got a problem with my plan, then you can either out us all and get us killed, or keep your mouth shut and follow my orders.”

            Auruo said nothing for several moments. “… Maybe I’m not completely understanding.”

            “I’ll walk you through it again. Perhaps I’m using words that your feeble mind can simply not comprehend.”

            “You’re pushing your luck here, Erwin,” Auruo shouted, perhaps a bit too loudly.

            “ _My_ luck?” Clear blue hues shot an icy glare at Auruo that sent shivers down the man’s spine and froze his mouth shut. “I’ve got an entire platoon of soldiers paroling this neighborhood and I will _not_ die at their hands because you cannot keep your voice down.”

            Erwin’s alacrity to throw away human life in order to save himself was sickening, Levi noted, and had to cover his mouth with his hand to keep down a mouthful of vomit. He watched Auruo’s face turn pale, and listened to his voice grow timid and hoarse.

            “Right. Yes, sir. My apologies, sir.”

            Levi snorted softly from his seat on the sofa in the living room. Auruo reminded him vaguely of a beaten dog. Then again, he supposed, that would be the pot calling the kettle black.  Levi was still unable to be too close to the soldier. The last time he’d tried to shake Erwin’s hand, Levi ended up fainting and nearly choking to death on his own bile.

            Petra cleared her throat. “Listen, either we follow his plan or we die. Put your god damned pride aside for ten seconds and think of the lives we are putting at stake just by having this meeting right here, right now.”

            “… Sorry. Go on, Erwin.” Auruo ran his fingers through his hair and took a deep breath, trying to calm himself down.

            “Alright, but please, don’t argue until I’ve finished,” the man responded with a grumble, fiddling with his sterling silver cufflinks. If Levi owned one pair of those, he could feed a family of four for a year. Yet here Erwin was, showing them off in front of a family of three who could barely afford to buy food for a week.

            _Germans are truly disgusting._

            Erwin continued, without missing a beat. “I know a man. Foley is his name. He’s a passport control officer, who’s been helping Jews escape Germany for quite some time with the use of fake papers. Until I can get in contact with him, the only excuse I have for continuing to visit your home is that I have taken your wife as a mistress,” Petra’s cheeks burned a bright pink, and Auruo stared at the table, biting his tongue until it bled.

            This time, it was Levi who interjected. “Does that mean you’ve done this before?”

            Erwin looked him right in the eye, and the Jew couldn’t repress the overwhelming sense of security he found in those eyes. Disgusting. He should have been frightened. He should have been murdering this soldier with his own two hands. But he wasn’t.

            “Yes,” Erwin said, softly. “I have.”

            Levi regarded him for a while, in the dim candlelight of the room, and then gave a small nod for him to continue. Erwin obeyed.

            “It will take me at least a week or so to obtain contact. We have a code that cannot be deciphered by my superiors; they have a habit of opening my mail, you see. But it takes quite some time for my letters to be sent out, and it will take longer for his to arrive. We’re looking at… a month, give or take, of continuing to hide Levi here until we are able to safely smuggle him out.”

            “How will we do that?” Petra’s voice, tentative and slow. “There are only two people registered to be living in this house, and we do not have guests. No one has seen him come in, so how on Earth are we going to explain him coming out?”

            “What, do you think we’ll be doing this in the middle of the day? You must be mad. No, we’ll have him moved. There are plenty of bodies that litter the streets in the Jewish ghetto just a mile from here. They bring a cart of dead Jews around every day to dispose of…”

            Levi caught onto the plan right away, and gritted his teeth. “If you treat Jews like rats to be exterminated and expect me to willingly shove myself into a body bag for you, you’ve got another thing coming, pretty boy.” He hissed, venom dripping from his words.

            Erwin turned his head and observed Levi in the low light for a moment before he spoke. “Your accent isn’t German.”

            “No shit. I’m not German. That’s why we’re speaking English.”

            “How did you get here?”

            Levi merely stared, gaze filled with hatred. He would have spat at the soldier’s face, had he the energy. Erwin stared right back, his icy blue gaze unwavering. Finally, Levi looked away to dig around in his pocket for the train ticket that still lay there. Though crumpled and faded, it was still legible. He stood shakily, and Petra stood up to go help him, but Erwin held up his hand for her to stay put as the Jew hobbled over to the trio at the kitchen table.

            His hands did not shake as he handed the ticket to the soldier.

            Petra and Auruo leaned over the table to get a better look at it as well. The ticket was in French, but the writing on it was German, in thick, tidy cursive.

            “What does it say?” Levi asked, still staring at Erwin’s eyes though they no longer regarded him.

            The soldier hesitated for a moment before he looked up. Sorrow was evident on his face, and it made Levi want to shrink back, but he held his ground, and repeated his question.

            “What does it say, Erwin?” He hated himself for allowing his voice to shake the way it did.

            The soldier sucked in a breath and ran his gloved fingers through his hair. “It reads: ‘These are the last three dogs I’m sending you today.’”

            Levi’s heart jumped into his throat, and as he began to fall backwards again, this time it was Erwin who steadied him. The Jew was almost not aware that he had been caught until he inhaled a lungful of expensive French cologne; the very same that his father had been wearing on the train the last time he had seen his family, and he was unable to stop the tears from streaming down his face.

            Without knowing why, he reached up to grip the back of Erwin’s pristine Nazi uniform and balled it up in his fists, pressing his face into that infuriatingly clean, pressed dress shirt, and sobbed until he thought his lungs would burst in his chest.

            Petra reached across the table and gripped her husband’s hand, and he reached up to wipe the tears from her cheeks.

            Erwin just held Levi there, arms wrapped securely around the man’s waist to keep him from crumpling against the floorboards. He looked down at Levi, watching as sobs wracked the tiny, fragile frame of the man that he had once known as Humanity’s Strongest Soldier. He remembered nothing of his previous life; that much had been obvious when he’d recoiled at the mere sight of Erwin, shaking like an Italian Greyhound. Almost as soon as he’d laid eyes on Levi he regretted ever entering that house, and debated just turning on his heel and walking out, and never coming back. Perhaps that would make things easier; he’d cross the Bossard’s home off of his list, and leave them to figure things out on their own.

Erwin cursed softly, reaching up to support Levi’s neck as it lolled tiredly against his chest. Levi slowly began to calm himself down, his sobs reduced to small sniffles and uneven breaths. The pale fists that had been balled tightly against the smooth fabric now fell limp at his sides, dangling uselessly like heavy weights fastened to chains. He looked as though he were about to fall asleep against Erwin for a moment, until he tilted his head to look up at the man. His eyes were swollen and red, but still the calm, brilliant grey that Erwin remembered so well, and briefly, he wondered how in the world he had even considered leaving.

            Erwin looked right back at him, and there was a small flicker of recognition in Levi’s eyes. For a moment, Levi had remembered _something_. And then he was shoving the soldier away from him in a mess of swinging limbs and French curses.

            Levi stumbled back haphazardly, slipping on the rug and landing flat on his backside on the hard wooden floor. A loud _thud_ resounded throughout the little house, and startled them all. For several horror-filled seconds, and eerie silence blanketed the living room, and they all waited to see if anyone outside had heard.

            Levi was the first of them that came to the realization that if anyone had been outside in the first place, Erwin probably wouldn’t have let Petra bring Levi up to join them all in the living room. Paranoia was a slowly-spreading epidemic; though Levi had not been aware that it was even spreading to Hitler’s perfect German soldiers. So he sat there, on the floor, scooting back away from Erwin and hoisting himself up with the help of the wall.

            “Who _are_ you?” Levi hissed, hands balling into fists as Erwin moved to loosen his tie just a bit.

            “I believe we’ve already been introduced.”

            “You know what I mean, pig.”

            “I’m afraid I don’t.”

            The Jew gritted his teeth, glowering up at the Nazi who stood before him. The space between them seemed completely infinite, and yet Levi couldn’t help but feel crowded. He was not safe there. Not in that room, in that house, in that city, in that country.

            Levi muttered something through his teeth, barely moving his lips as he spoke.

            Erwin narrowed his eyes. “Don’t mumble. It’s impolite.”

            _Impolite._

            “I said, don’t treat me like that,” Levi practically spat the words at Erwin’s horrible, gloomy boots. “I’m supposed to be with my family in Lyon. I’m supposed to be safe and clean and healthy but instead I’m here, living under your feet like a fucking rodent, and you’re treating me like a mongoloid. I’m not stupid. I speak two languages, I can read and write, I know how to use a telegraph. You’ve _met_ me somewhere, I can tell, and I’m asking who you are. Answer me. It’s the least you can do, considering everything you fuckers have put me through already.”

            _How’s that for impolite, asshole?_

            Erwin stared at him for a moment. “I wonder if there might be a place we could speak in private.”

            “I’m not letting you anywhere near me if those two aren’t in the room.” Levi gestured towards Petra and Auruo.

            “Then I will say what I said before: my name is Erwin Smith, and I’m a medical officer in Hitler’s Third Reich.”

            “Fuck you.”

            Auruo cleared his throat. “Levi,” He didn’t wait for a response. “You need to calm down. You’ll faint again if you stress yourself out too much.”

            “Like he gives a shit. Easier to shove me in a body bag that way.”

            “Levi,” Petra snapped. “Remember what I told you.”

            “I don’t _trust_ him.”

            Those words cut more deeply into Erwin’s heart than he was willing to admit. He remembered how close they had been so long ago; in another time, another life that was completely different from this now. He recalled being the only person that Levi admitted to trusting, so long ago. But he supposed it was different now. That was a different life. They had been different men. It had been so long ago…

            “I can escape by myself,” Levi snapped indignantly.

 Erwin narrowed his eyes; now the man was not only being stubborn, but stupid as well. Those two things mixed to form ignorance, which was, at that particular point in time, a rather annoying strain of terminal disease.

“And just how do you plan to do that?” Erwin kept his composure.

“I’ll hide inside someone’s suitcase.”

With a deep breath, the Nazi ran his gloved fingers through his hair. Levi found his lack of concern absolutely infuriating. No matter what Levi did, he couldn’t break that man’s equanimity. When Erwin opened his eyes again, Levi could have sworn he’d spotted just a hint of wrath hidden behind those serene blue eyes, and it ignited a fire of contentment within him, as if he were a toddler who’d succeeded in gaining his parent’s attention.

“If you’d like to try, be my guest, but do so with the knowledge that you will not survive.”

“How do you know?”

“Do you have any idea what they—what _we_ do in those stations?”

Levi suddenly felt very sick. Erwin seemed to pause, and regard Levi with an expression of concern as he noticed the man turn pale. Mercury-colored hues shifted back to lock with ice, and Levi gritted his teeth.

“Oh, please,” he snatched back his father’s train ticket—which had been nestled safely in the palm of the soldier until that point—and made a show of tucking it safely away in the pocket of his trousers. “ _Enlighten_ me.”

Erwin eyed the faded, dirty piece of parchment as it fluttered through the air, as it was carefully returned to its rightful owner. The fact that Levi seemed to care more about a piece of paper than the other three human beings in the room was disconcerting.

“We stab the luggage,” Erwin stated, bluntly. “Repeatedly. No matter how small the suitcase might be. Any passengers bringing a suitcase onto a train scheduled to leave Germany are subject to random ‘inspections.’”

“So you’ve done it before?”

“Yes.”

“Have you ever found anyone?”

The questions came suddenly. Erwin, try as he might, could not understand why in the world Levi would want to know the answers to such inquiries. There was no point in lying.

“… Yes. A little boy.”

“Did you hurt him?”

“Yes. He cried, and asked me to stop beating him.”

“And, did you?”

“No.”

A heavy silence fell over the room. Petra covered her face with both hands, and Auruo wrapped his arms around her shoulders. Levi stared at Erwin, searching that stone cold face for some hint of remorse. He was not surprised when he found none. Levi stood, leaned forward, and spat into that sharp, clean-shaven German face.

“ _Pig_.” Levi showed himself back to his room, letting the trap door fall heavily shut behind him.

 

 

Days underground passed more slowly than Levi would like admit. He could not see the sun or the stars or the moon; he couldn’t even see them when he was upstairs, because the curtains had to be drawn whenever there was a chance of him coming back up. Petra had told him that he could only come up when Erwin told him to. Nazis patrolled the neighborhood frequently, and would not ask politely to enter their home if they noticed suspicious activity, such as the curtains being drawn at odd hours of the night.

            Levi did not appreciate being dependent on so many other people. All he did was put everyone around him in danger. Erwin had not visited since their argument, which had been upwards of two weeks ago.

            On the upside, Petra had continued to clean his arm, just as Erwin had ordered, and the skin had almost completely knit itself back together. She was down in the cellar with him, gently cutting through the (now useless) stitches, fully intent on taking them out as gently as possible.

            “You’re lucky he found you when he did, you know.” She tugged one of the strings out of his arm.

            “I’m lucky _you_ found me when you did.” he responded curtly, wincing as the thread caught against his skin, which had begun to heal around it.

            “That, too.”

            They didn’t say anything else for a while. Petra’s hands were shaky, and Levi tried his best to keep his arm still, so that she could help him a little easier. Several thoughts swam through Levi’s head, all while he stared at the dingy ceiling above him, trying to imagine that it was covered in stars. He hadn’t seen the stars in months. He hadn’t seen the sky. Hadn’t been outside, felt the sun on his face, or the breeze through his hair or the rain on his body. He hadn’t been able to do so many things he’d once taken for granted.

            Levi didn’t notice that Petra had finished plucking the little bits of thread from his arm until she gave him a gentle pat. She’d bandaged it one more time for good measure and handed him a piece of bread and a bowl of good, hearty soup. Erwin had sent someone over with onions and carrots, and she’d still had a bit of beef left. There were always plenty of potatoes, and those ingredients together made for quite a nice stew.

            He took them gratefully and ate slowly. He’d learned his lesson the first time, after he’d practically inhaled a piece of bread that came back up because he’d eaten too quickly.

            “Thank you,” he said, leaving out what he did not have the strength to say. Thank you for taking me in. Thank you for taking care of me and feeding me. Thank you for risking your life to keep me safe. Thank you for pretending to have an affair just to help me escape. Thank you for caring about me. Thank you for saving my life.

            “You’re welcome,” she responded, standing.

            He nodded, and watched her leave again, thinking that of all the people that could have stumbled across him in that alley, he was glad it had been her.

 

 

There were very few nights that Levi actually slept. He dozed frequently, against the wall or on the cool floor, but he did not sleep. He didn’t feel like he needed to. All he did was eat, and try to gain back his strength by walking quietly up and down the basement stairs for hours on end. Sometimes, he overheard conversations upstairs. They were hard to make out most of the time, but sometimes they raised their voices at each other, and Levi could hear every word perfectly, even though they spoke German.

            He sat on the steps one night, out of breath from his exercise, and heard Petra storm down the stairs. He could tell it was her from her petite footsteps. Auruo followed soon after. This time, they yelled in English. He sat on the steps of the basement, and listen to Petra storm in, then Auruo. The stark difference in the sound of their footfalls was amusing. They’d been arguing in German before, but he’d heard them switch to English several times when they got really upset. Perhaps they assumed that none of the neighbors would understand; though they’d forgotten that the man under the floorboards could.

“I’m just saying, maybe that’s a better idea.” Auruo’s voice. He sounded exasperated, as though they’d been arguing for hours.

“You agreed to this when you agreed to help me carry him down there.” Petra countered. She was in the kitchen now.

“I know, but neither of us were expecting Erwin to show up, and—”

“And nothing, Auruo.”

“You know how dangerous this is! Why won’t you just hear me out?”

“Because I’m not dumping him on someone else!”

            Levi wrinkles his nose. ‘ _I’m not dumping him on someone else._ ’ Like he was a heavy, replaceable sack of potatoes.

“We agreed to this. You said we’d help him until the end, Auruo, remember?”

“Yes, and then someone much more capable came along. Erwin. We trust him, we know him, and we all know Levi, too. Levi doesn’t remember. Erwin does. Erwin can help; you know he’d never hurt Levi, not in a million years.”

“He was our commander! He’d sacrifice anything for the sake of humanity! I don’t know about now, but back then, he was just as ruthless as he is now.”

            Levi was confused. Who the hell were they talking about? Surely not Erwin; he wasn’t worthy of the dirt beneath his own feet, as far as Levi was concerned. There was no way he’d ever been the commander of anything.

“He stabbed a child to death, Auruo.” Petra’s voice dropped to a soft whisper, and Auruo was silent for several moments before he spoke again.

“Levi is no child. He could handle himself then, why not now?”

“ _Mein Gott_ , Auruo! Listen to yourself! He can barely make it up those stairs without fainting; at the very least, we need to strengthen him up before we just hand him over like a prisoner of war.”

“Are you saying you don’t trust the commander?”

“The only people I trusted were in our squad. Captain Levi included.”

            Captain? _Captain_ Levi?

“I’ll take that as a no.”

Petra’s voice grew in volume. “I didn’t trust him then, and I sure as hell don’t trust him now. Not after that little show he put on in front of Levi.”

“It’s our only hope, Petra. What are you planning to do without his help? Wait until the war is over?”

“The war can’t last forever.”

“Be reasonable, Petra! You’re going to be the reason he dies!” Auruo was close to screaming now, though he seemed to be holding back. Petra, however, had no problem screaming her reply.

“I’d rather it be me than that Nazi!”

            Suddenly, the sound of gunshots resounded through the house. Levi stood abruptly, nearly banging his head against the hard wooden trap door, his heart racing in his chest. For a moment he was convinced that Petra and Auruo had both been shot, but the sounds of their rushed footsteps told him otherwise. They ran to shut off the lights and look through the front window; Levi could hear the old floorboards moan beneath their weight.

Auruo’s voice came in a panicked, hushed tone. He said something in German that Levi did not understand. Petra smacked him once and told him to shut his mouth (Levi had learned a few German phrases during his stay, at least). The two of them sat by the window, terrified, and watched. Levi could hear them breathing, hear them grab for each other’s hands.

He heard shouting outside, very briefly. It was a soldier, no doubt about it, yelling something in German loud enough for the whole neighborhood to hear. Levi did not know what was going on. He heard the soldier begin to count.

“Ein!” A gunshot.

“Zwei!” Another gunshot.

“Drei! Veir! Fünf!” Three more.

There was an eerie silence that fell over the neighborhood then. Levi could not see the five Jewish refugees who’d snuck into Munich. He had not seen the way the Germans had made them kneel in the middle of the street. He had not seen the way the Germans had asked for the French Jew to come out of hiding, holding their lives for ransom. He had not seen the way the blood ran from their heads and into a collective river that carried what would soon be the only remaining proof of their existence into the gutter.

“ _Wir werden jeden letzten jew finden!_ ” The soldier shouted, holding his pistol in the air, and shouting then at the people who watched, horrified, from their windows. “We will find every last Jew! Anyone who turns the Frenchman in now will be rewarded for their aid to the _Führer!_ ” 

Levi sat on the steps and waited. He could not understand what was being said at all; it was far too muffled for him to even recognize a few words. Petra and Auruo gripped each other’s hands beneath the windowsill. Levi could smell the sweat that poured down the backs of their necks, hear the way they shifted uncomfortably just above him, their breathing heavy through their noses.

There was a pause from the soldier, momentarily, and then he shouted something else, and the sound of a platoon could be heard marching through the streets. Without thinking, Levi stumbled down the steps and back onto his cot, staring up at the floorboards. He didn’t know where the soldiers were going, if Erwin was among them, or, if Erwin did happen to be there, whether or not the man would protect him.

The trap door swung open heavily and Petra peered in, terror evident on her face. “Levi, get up.” She ordered, nearly jumping down the stairs to fetch him.

“What’s going on?” He asked her as she took hold of his arm and tugged him upwards, forcing him to stand.

“They know you’re in Munich, but they don’t know where. They’re searching homes now.”

Levi paled. “Right now?”

“Yes.” She pulled him up the basement steps and back up to the house. Levi spared a glance outside. The sky was dark. There were no stars or clouds, and there was no one in sight that would have seen him walk across the foyer and into a coat closet. Petra opened the door and shoved him inside, sparing only a few moments to give him instructions. “There is a panel of the wall at the back that can be removed and put back on from the inside. Hide there until I tell you to come out.”

She shut the door and he heard her run back down to the cellar to fold up the cot and hide it behind a sack of flour and a German flag. He thought she must have been stupid, running up and down from the cellar like that with the curtains wide open. If someone were to have seen her, she would have given them all away with just her actions. Luckily, no one did. She had just shut the door and covered it again with the rug when the soldiers reached her home.

Levi scrambled to the back of the closet and nearly tore at the wall, searching in the dark until he found the part that split off. It was virtually invisible, and Levi, barely 160 centimeters, could barely stuff himself inside. But it worked. He tucked his knees to his chest and put his head between his legs, pulling the panel back onto the wall and making sure it was secure.

He did not know how much time had passed. He did know the soldier had been inside the house far longer than they should have been. Perhaps they had smelled the basement and found that no kind of meat would make it smell like that. Perhaps they’d found the cot. Levi did not know. The closet had only been opened once and the soldier had stepped inside, turned on the light, torn through the clothes on the hangers and left without flipping the light switch again.

Levi bit his lip. It was humiliating to stuff himself into a hole in the wall and wait while the people that had kept him alive for so many months could very well be dying right outside the closet in which he was hidden. His body ached from the strain of keeping such a tight position for so long. He was sure it had been at least half an hour, though in reality perhaps it was only minutes that had passed while he had been stuffed inside the wall. Levi could not hear anything outside of the closet; no movement, no noise, nothing. He waited.

It felt like it had been hours by the time he heard someone come into the closet again and turn off the light. Levi was tempted to call out to them, but he knew better.

He let his head fall back against the wall, gently, and thought he might close his eyes for only a moment. He was tired, and needed a rest, and just then seemed like the perfect time to do so. He was sure that no matter how relaxed he might have been, his body would not budge from the tiny crawlspace without help.

 

Levi did not know how long he had been asleep, but he jolted awake with a gasp, nearly slamming his head against the top of the little crawlspace. He needed to talk to Erwin. Right away.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> THIS SHOULD NOT HAVE TAKEN AS LONG AS IT DID TO WRITE. IM GOMEN.


	5. The Epiphany

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AND 3 YEARS LATER AT 2 AM IM FINALLY UPDATING THIS FIC  
> im so sorry, it's also hella short but iM WRITING MORE RIGHT NOW OKAY I PROMISE I WILL FINISH THIS

Oftentimes, it take years and years of darkness to bring things to the light. You can live your whole life willfully ignorant, ignoring dreams and messages sent to you from God telling you about yourself. Many people think that epiphanies come slowly, peacefully, out of the inviting darkness of the mind. 

This is not the case. 

Without thinking, Levi pushed open the small door to the crawl space and nearly spilled out of it with a great thud, taking a moment to stretch his aching limbs, reveling in the relief it gave his tightened muscles. The door to the closet swung open suddenly, and Levi’s heard leapt into this throat. He was on the ground, defenseless, belly-up. 

The clothes moved swiftly to the side, revealing Petra, standing there with a puzzled expression. “Levi?” She asked carefully, kneeling down to help the Frenchman to his feet. “What the hell are you still doing here? I thought you left hours ago.” 

Levi shook his head, gripping Petra’s shoulders with strength he did not know he had. “I need to speak with Erwin. As soon as possible. Is there any way you can call on him?” 

“No,” Petra’s confusion only seemed to grow with each passing moment. “Even if there were, it would not be in our best interest to call upon a Nazi after what happened last night. You shouldn’t even be up here.” 

Levi cursed under his breath. She was right: drawing unnecessary attention to the little house would lead to a swift and painful downfall. They would find Levi, and they would kill him as well as his German saviors. His grip on Petra’s shoulders loosened, and his hands fell to his sides once more. “Alright. Take me back down to the cellar.” 

Petra looked behind them both slowly, out of the windows in the front room that offered a clear view of the cellar door. No one was in sight, but she still waved Auruo over to keep watch in the meantime. She took Levi gently by the hand. “Quickly, now.” 

The journey down into the cellar took much less time than it normally did, considering the fiasco of the previous night. Levi did not let go of Petra’s hand as she tried to return to the surface, to her world, to leave Levi alone in the cold darkness of that cellar once again. “Wait,” He pleaded, pretending that his voice did not break as he did so. “Tell me what happened last night.” 

Petra looked at him and then back up towards the cellar door, taking time to make a seemingly impossible decision. Finally, she sat on the old wooden steps, and invited Levi to sit down next to her. He did. 

“What do you want to know?” She said, hushed, as if she were frightened that someone else might hear them. 

“What was that man yelling about last night?” 

Petra swallowed. “… He said that if anyone comes forward with information about you, they would be rewarded. And then he killed… five Jews. Their bodies are still outside.” 

Levi suddenly felt very sick. He had never dreamed that he would be dehumanized for something he believed in— for something he wasn’t even sure if he believed in any longer. As if Petra could sense his unease, she reached out for his hand and held it tight. Fat tears streamed down her face, and she shook with silent sobs. 

“I-I’m so sorry… I’m so sorry, Levi. I don’t understand why this is happening. It’s cruel.” 

Levi could not help but cry too, gripping the German’s hand like the rest of the world would fall away if he didn’t. The two of them stayed there like that for several moments, crying into the darkness, consumed with despair and fear. What were they to do? What happens next? Both had questions, and neither had answers. 

Eventually, Petra wiped her eyes and heaved a great sigh. “Why did you need to talk to Erwin? You can tell me what you need, and I’ll let him know.” 

The Frenchman shook his head. “I… I’m not comfortable telling you. I’m sorry.”

Petra didn’t seem offended, or taken aback. “It’s alright. Next time he comes by, I’m sure that he’ll want to see how you’re doing. You can tell him then.” She smiled, but the expression did not reach her eyes. It was hollow. Empty. Fearful. 

Levi let go of her hand. “I’ll let you get back to it, then.” He murmured. 

Petra nodded and turned to leave without saying a word. 

Levi was alone, again. He remained on the steps for several more hours, sitting in silence, listening to Petra and Auruo move stiffly upstairs. It suddenly felt as though Levi were watching the world through two feet of glass. There was a bounty on his head now, and he was suddenly aware of just how bad his situation really was; he was a mouse in the heart of a cat kingdom. A deer in a clearing during open season. A Jew in the heart of Nazi Germany. 

—

Hours, days, weeks, months. Who could keep track without a calendar? Without sunlight? Levi did not know how long he had really been here. He knew it was cold, and that was the extent of his knowledge. Had his birthday already passed? How old was he? 

Time, although evasive, moved ever forward. Time waited for no one. 

Levi included. 

One cold winter (autumn?) day, there was a knock at the front door of the little house. Levi sat up in bed, walking halfway up the stairs, waiting there for the cellar to open. He knew who it was. He heard those familiar footsteps, that deep, baritone voice. Erwin. 

Petra seemed taken aback to find Levi waiting at the trap door when she opened it, and then a warm smile spread across her face. “You seem to have gotten your strength back, Levi.” 

Levi nodded at her and stepped out of the cellar, looking Erwin straight in the eyes. “I need to talk to you.” He stated firmly. Erwin seemed surprised by the Jew’s forward nature, expecting the sick, timid man he had met not 3 weeks prior. 

“Alone?” Erwin asked, arching an eyebrow. 

“Yes.”

“… Well, then.” The soldier followed Levi down into the cellar, amidst worried glances exchanged by the Bossards, who were unsure of whether or not they trusted Erwin enough to leave him alone with Levi. Even so, they shut the two of them into the cold, dark cellar, and a silence blanketed them until Levi heard the two of them move back into the kitchen. 

“So, this is where you live now?” Erwin asked softly, looking around the dimly-lit room, sparsely filled with canned food and the cot that Levi spent most of his time in. He appeared sympathetic, almost sad. 

Levi nodded, eyes narrowing as he peered into Erwin’s eerily familiar face. “Our homes don’t make us who we are. What we do is what defines us.”

Erwin chuckled. “Still wise beyond your years, hm?” 

Levi was uncomfortable with how nostalgic he felt. It was like he had known this man for his entire life—though he had no memory of him. It was gnawing and the back of his mind, a question he’d had since their very first meeting: “Who are you, Erwin?” 

The soldier’s smile disappeared, and his face hardened. “… I’m not sure you’ll believe me if I tell you the truth.” 

“I had a dream,” Levi blurted. “A few days ago, maybe a week, I don’t know. But I had a dream. There were giant monsters, a-and… I was a soldier. I could fly.” 

Erwin lurched forward and gripped Levi by the shoulders, frantically looking to Levi’s face for any signs of fabrication. “Levi, what else do you remember from the dream?” 

“You’re scaring me—“ 

“Answer me.” 

“I-I don’t remember anything else, just… just freedom. I remember feeling free.” Levi’s heart raced in his chest as he watched Erwin, whose face showed more emotion now that all of the times Levi had previously seen him combined. 

The German sighed and let Levi go, running his fingers through his hair. “That was no dream, Levi. It was an entire life we lived: You and me, Petra and Auruo too. I was the commander of an entire fleet of soldiers, and you were the most powerful of them all.”


End file.
